ABC Perth office vandalised by pro-Palestine activist after Antoinette Lattouf sacking

ABC Radio’s Perth headquarters has been vandalised by a pro-Palestine activist after the shock axing of presenter Antoinette Lattouf.

ABC Radio’s Perth headquarters has been vandalised by a pro-Palestine activist after the shock axing of presenter Antoinette Lattouf.

Lattouf was controversially dismissed on Wednesday after she made social media posts criticising the Israeli Defence Forces and the violence that continues to unfold in Gaza.

Ms Lattouf had recently been filling in for Sarah Macdonald on ABC Sydney in the morning, but was given her marching orders by the broadcaster over her political posts.

Numerous complaints from the ABC’s Jewish listeners led to Ms Lattouf’s firing, with chairwoman Ita Buttrose making the decision.

Images of the protester vandalising the Perth office were shared online on Sunday. Graffiti on the building called for a boycott in support of Ms Lattouf and said “free Palestine”.

The vandal claimed the action was a protest against the “unjust firing” of Ms Lattouf for her reporting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

ABC Radio’s Perth headquarters has been vandalised by a pro-Palestine activist after the shock axing of presenter Antoinette Lattouf.

“Direct action was taken against the ABC Radio office in Boorloo/Perth to protest [the] unjust firing of Antoinette Lattouf over her factual reporting of the Israeli genocide against the people of Palestine,” a message alongside the video read.

“This act of censorship by the ABC management is an affront to the very idea of journalistic integrity.”

A similar graffiti protest occurred at the ABC’s Melbourne Headquarters.

According to The Australian, ABC chair Ita Buttrose was “furious” Ms Lattouf was put in the fill-in position in the first place given her inflammatory posts on social media about the Middle East.

Sources say complaints had been sent to the ABC board and managing director David Anderson.

Ms Lattouf, who is of Lebanese heritage and whose parents came to Australia as refugees in the 1970s, is outspoken on her social media accounts.

Lattouf was controversially dismissed on Wednesday after social media posts criticising the Israeli Defence Forces and the violence that continues to unfold in Gaza.

She drew criticism for repeatedly suggesting videos of pro-Palestine protesters chanting “gas the Jews” at the Sydney Opera House in October were unverified.

Ms Lattouf, formerly a senior journalist with Channel 10 and the ABC and a columnist for the Sydney Morning Herald, is no stranger to controversy.

She founded the Media Diversity Network in 2017 with a mission to make the media “less white” and criticised the ABC for “covert discrimination” and treating ethnics like “box-ticking hires”.

In 2021 she called out the Kennedy Awards for journalism on social media for a 60 person judging panel that included five white men named Peter but only 15 women and no people of colour.

Her first book, How to Lose Friends and Influence White people, was published last year.

In 2019, television presenter Kerri-Anne Kennerley asked Ms Lattouf whether she had “forgotten her pants that day” before asking her if she was “thirsty” live on air.

Ms Lattouf later told the Sydney Morning Herald she stayed silent despite being humiliated because she feared a backlash.

“I knew that she was denigrating me on air and it was awful but if I pushed back, I’d probably be framed as an angry brown woman and slut-shamed further,” she said.

“One of us would come out unscathed, and it wouldn’t be me.”

A spokesperson for the ABC confirmed she would “not be back on air” for her final two shifts filling in this week.

ABC rules state that staff must be impartial and not post ‘thoughtless’ messages on social media which could compromise this position.